Pope Francis visits Myanmar next week, a delicate trip for the world's most senior Christian to a majority Buddhist country accused by Washington of the "ethnic cleansing" of Muslim Rohingya people, reports Reuters.
He will also visit Bangladesh to where more than 600,000 people have fled from what Amnesty International called "crimes against humanity" including murder, rape torture and forcible displacement, allegations the Myanmar military denies.
The trip is so delicate that some of the pope's advisors have warned him against even saying the word "Rohingya," lest he set off a diplomatic incident that could turn the country's military and government against minority Christians.
The most tense moments of the Nov 26-Dec 2 trip are likely to be private meetings with army head Senior General Min Aung Hlaing and, separately, civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Myanmar does not recognise Rohingya as citizens nor as a group with its own identity, posing a dilemma for Francis as he visits a country of 51 million people where only around 700,000 are Roman Catholics.
"He risks either compromising his moral authority or putting in danger the Christians of that country," said Father Thomas Reese, a prominent American author and analyst at Religion News Service.
"I have great admiration for the pope and his abilities, but someone should have talked him out of making this trip," he wrote.
Vatican sources say some in the Holy See believe the trip was decided too hastily after full diplomatic ties were established in May during a visit by Suu Kyi, whose global esteem as a Nobel Peace Prize laureate has been tarnished by expressing doubts about the rights abuse allegations and failing to condemn the military.
"Pope Francis needs to be firm on all fronts. While the violence cannot stop without the cooperation of security forces, Suu Kyi should not be given a free pass either," said Lynn Kuok, a fellow of the Brookings Institution's Centre for East Asia Policy Studies.
In a late addition to his itinerary, Francis will meet Rohingya refugees on the second leg of his trip in the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka. His meeting with General Min Aung Hlaing was also a late addition following negotiations with the military by Myanmar's senior churchman, Cardinal Charles Bo.
